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Conviction April 8, 2016 Homicide

Ingrid Lyne

Status Conviction
Type Homicide
Date April 8, 2016
Location Renton, Washington
Victim Age 40
Gender Female

Forty-year-old Ingrid Lyne was murdered in Renton, Washington. Her dismembered remains were found in multiple locations including trash bins. John Robert Charlton, a man she had met through online dating, was convicted of her murder and sentenced to life.

Ingrid Maree Lyne was a 40-year-old registered nurse at Swedish Medical Center and a mother of three from Renton, Washington. On the evening of April 8, 2016, she attended a Seattle Mariners baseball game with John Robert Charlton, a man she had met about a month earlier through an online dating site. After the game the pair reportedly went to a bar and then returned to Lyne's Renton home. When Lyne failed to appear the next morning to pick up her daughters from their father, she was reported missing. On April 10, 2016, a homeowner in the Central District of Seattle discovered human remains in a recycling bin roughly 10 miles from Lyne's home, and the King County Medical Examiner later identified them as Lyne and ruled her death a homicide.

Investigators found blood, human tissue, and a pruning saw in the bathroom of Lyne's home, along with trash bags identical to those in which her dismembered remains had been placed. According to police, Lyne's mother, using a cell phone left at the residence, exchanged text messages with Charlton and then contacted authorities. Charlton was arrested on April 11, 2016, and on April 13, 2016, King County prosecutors charged him with first-degree murder and auto theft; he was held on $5 million bail. Additional remains were recovered at other locations in the days that followed, on April 15 and April 18, 2016. Prosecutors described Charlton as a homeless day laborer with a prior criminal record spanning several states.

Rather than proceed to trial, Charlton pleaded guilty to first-degree murder on October 2, 2017, admitting he strangled and dismembered Lyne. On January 5, 2018, a King County Superior Court judge sentenced him to 27 years and 9 months in prison, the term recommended by prosecutors. Charlton was convicted and remains incarcerated in the Washington State prison system; as of 2026 there are no reported appeals that have altered his conviction or sentence, and the case is closed. The recorded status of Conviction is accurate.

homicide Washington conviction online dating dismemberment
April 8, 2016
Ingrid Lyne attends a Seattle Mariners game with John Robert Charlton, whom she met through an online dating site; they later return to her Renton home.
April 9, 2016
Lyne fails to pick up her daughters and is reported missing.
April 10, 2016
Human remains later identified as Lyne are discovered in a recycling bin in Seattle, about 10 miles from her home.
April 11, 2016
John Robert Charlton is arrested.
April 13, 2016
Charlton is charged with first-degree murder and auto theft and held on $5 million bail.
April 15, 2016
Additional remains are found by a garbage collector.
April 18, 2016
More remains are recovered at a third location.
October 2, 2017
Charlton pleads guilty to first-degree murder in King County Superior Court.
January 5, 2018
Charlton is sentenced to 27 years and 9 months in prison.

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